Obviously another good hardcover but The Murdock Papers in undoubtedly the star of the show. - Thai
This is it the end of an era and one of the greatest runís of all time & certainly Daredevilís.
This is the last trade before the new team of Michael Lark & Ed Brubaker take over the series and while disappointed at Bendis & Maleevís departure I canít think of a more suitable fit.
Bizarrely this hardcover features both the last and first run by Bendis and in that order, personally I found this bizarre and a strange decision by Marvel so I read the first story Wake up before reading the final installment The Murdock Papers.

Wake up is a tale which follows reporter Ben Ulrich as he investigates the aftereffects of a fight between Daredevil and an obscure old villain called Leapfrog.
This story was different and something you donít often see in mainstream comics in the sense of this is more of a mystery orientated tale but at the same time is typically Bendis as this is really a dialogue based story and it goes without saying that the dialogue is the selling point of the story.
The art on the other hand is a mixed bag.
The art is a mish mash of styles ranging form hand penciled sketches to beautifully painted water colour splashes and really is incomparable to any other current artist.
Unfortunately though there is a flaw and in my opinion a huge one.
David Mack uses photo referencing and a number of A listers appear in these issues, itís like a story inspired from a movie as Leonardo DiCaprio plays Spider Man, Angelina Jolie plays the Kidís Mum, Kate Moss is the secretary at Murdock & Nelsonís attorney and Lauren Hill is the Kidís teacher among others.
The above may not seem a big deal but itís one of my pet hates and I find it very off putting and I found it hard to engage in the story at times.

The Murdock Papers in the final arc by bendis and Maleev after a number of years of pushing out extremely high quality work, some arcs have been better then others but the standard has always been high.
Well let me start of by saying this is definitely one of the high points of the series, exposed as Daredevil was once and for all and awaiting trail after being captured by the FBI it transpires that all the information on Matt Murdock being Daredevil has been collated into a file called the Murdock papers and now everyone is out to obtain this information either to clear Murdock or incriminate him.
Nearly everyone in Daredevilís back catalogue appears here and again one of the things that Bendis can be praised for across his run is his respect for the characters.
Kingpin is shown to still be the master manipulator he has always been and Bullseye is still as deadly as ever as shown in a very carefully constructed fight scene between him Daredevil and Elektra.
I really commend Bendis for end of his run he could have easily taken the soft option and left everyone in the same premise as when he first came on board and gave everyone a happy ending as some writers have done in the past but this ends with many possibilities for new scribe Brubaker to play around with.

Alex Maleev has also got to be commended for his work through this run and the huge improvements in his art from his first issue why back in issue 26 to know, his pacing and fight scenes especially have improved almost completely since his debut on the character.
His art can be far too dark in places but I couldnít think of any other artist who fitted the style of the book other then Maleev.
Dave Stewart the colourer on the book also deserves a mention as his colours suit Maleevs distinctive style.

On reflection Bendis run is that good that the name always mentioned in regard to the ultimate Daredevil runs Frank Miller may be replaced and I canít give it any more praise then that.
Obviously another good hardcover but The Murdock Papers in undoubtedly the star of the show.